European Parliament Committee backs rules to cut red tape for business and consumers in cross-border court cases

European Commission Vice-President Viviane Reding, the EU's Justice Commissioner, today welcomed a vote by the European Parliament's Legal Affairs Committee (JURI) to support her proposals to help businesses and consumers resolve cross-border legal disputes more easily. The Committee voted to back the reform of rules to determine which national court has jurisdiction in cross-border cases and how court judgements issued in one EU country are recognised and enforced in another (see IP/10/1705 and MEMO/10/677). The legislation proposed by the Commission in December 2010 aims to strengthen the Single Market and cut red tape. It proposes to abolish the costly "exequatur" procedure which requires companies to first go through a time-consuming and costly procedure in courts to get a judgement in civil and commercial matters recognised in another EU country. Abolishing this administrative procedure is expected to save businesses and consumers up to EUR 48 million a year. The Committee's report will now pass to the European Parliament's plenary session which is expected to vote on the proposal in November 2012.

"The new EU rules will ensure consumers and SMEs can settle cross-border legal disputes more quickly and cheaply, with savings of EUR 2,000 to EUR 12,000 in each case," said Vice-President Viviane Reding, the EU's Justice Commissioner. "I would like to thank the European Parliament's Legal Affairs Committee for their support, in particular the rapporteur Mr Zwiefka, and the Cypriot EU Presidency. I hope the European Parliament will now give our reform backing in plenary too so that we can move forward to early adoption of the Regulation. We have no time to waste: removing bureaucratic obstacles that impose extra costs and legal uncertainty on businesses is key for the creation of a European area of justice that makes our single market – the EU's engine for growth – more attractive."